Girth Hitch Guiding

Our Philosophy

Transformational Adventure!

Our Philosophy

Transformational Adventure!

At Girth Hitch we embrace failure and success while fostering genuine and safe experiences in the mountains.

For more than a decade I have spent most of my professional energy focusing on overseeing and delivering safe outdoor adventures to a wide demographic of guests. I have also invested a great deal of time developing and empowering other outdoor leaders. I haven’t always had a strong philosophy of transformational adventure, nor have I always been a guest centred guide.

As I look back, I see a lot of instances in which I have been self absorbed in my outdoor leadership. These past failures highlight for me, the value of transformational over transactional adventures.

~ Tim Taylor

 

So What Is Transformational Adventure?

Transformational Adventure is all about you — growing holistically.

We focus on creating a safety net in which you can experience real success and failure, while choosing to step into an appropriate level of challenge. At Girth Hitch we believe you are antifragile. This is one of our core beliefs, you can expect to be challenged if you step into a ‘Girth Hitch Transformational Adventure’. Our guides will leverage their professional perspective to safely challenge you. This may not always be comfortable, but it will be good.

Commitment To Excellence

Our commitment to technical excellence lays the foundation for the transformational adventure ‘safety net’.

Safely leading you into the mountains may require a deep reservoir of resilience and technical capacity. Our guides meet or exceed the highest safety standards in the country, so they have a lot of capacity leftover to focus on your transformational adventure.  At Girth Hitch our guides are deeply committed to developing and maintaining the required technical margin so that the day can be all about your Transformational Adventure; rather than it being about merely surviving the day.

Competency And Risk Management

Moving in the mountains is inherently hazardous. This is partly the reason why people are drawn to the mountains.

Adventuring in the mountains while managing the inherent risk, offers an incredible opportunity for building resilience and competence. Challenging yourself in a mountainous environment can develop depth and capacity that will ultimately transfer to the rest of your life.

Holistic Safety And The Right Objective

Our first priority is your holistic safety. When choosing objectives we look for environments that offer the appropriate level of risk and reward, while at the same time, safely challenging you out of your comfort zone.

With that said, there are times in the mountains when environmental or personal conditions unexpectedly change. Our commitment to your holistic safety may require that the planned day’s objective alters dynamically to align with those changing conditions. Sometimes it may even mean that we don’t hit the summit, regardless of whether it was the stated objective at the beginning of the day. We recognize that the appropriate degree of challenge in consideration of the environmental circumstances, is a key factor in nurturing your transformational adventure.

You Are Anti-fragile:

Some things benefit from shocks; they thrive and grow when exposed to volatility, randomness, disorder, and stressors and love adventure , risk, and uncertainty. Yet, in spite of the ubiquity of the phenomenon, there is no word for the exact opposite of fragile. Let us call it antifragile. Antifragility is beyond resilience or robustness. The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better.

~ Nassim Taleb